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Izmir Mall / Butterflies / Carrying Capacity

Shopping malls are everywhere these days, all over the world. Same old stores, same old food, same old architecture and even the same all people - mall rats. The city of Izmir is no exception. But don't be deceived by those fake-plastic butterflies. Here's something that should give you the real butterflies:

In 1798, a British clergyman named Thomas Robert Malthus wrote a very influential essay titled An Essay on the Principle of Population, predicting that the world could not indefinitely support an growing human population, and that as we approached the subsistence limit, the lower classes would be first to pay through poverty, famine and disease. Throughout most of the 20th century, most scientists and economists dismissed Malthus' theories, pointing to the advances in science and technology, especially in food production.

In the last decade or so, scientists are backtracking on their dismissal of Malthus, and again discussing carrying capacity as a limit independent of how much technology we may throw at it. Duh! How could anyone assume "infinite growth on a finite planet". So, when will we reach carrying capacity? "When" is the wrong question, but, if we do not all wake up very soon, and realize that we're all interconnected in the same world - whatever happens in China impacts what happens in the U.S.A. - the answer is: very soon. But we are too "busy" to consider such serious issues, we'd rather head to the mall.